Crisis Text Line

According to the CDC, suicide is the third leading cause of death for youth between the ages of 10 and 24; additionally, many more youth are attempt suicide. Each year, 157,000 youth receive medical care for self-inflicted injuries at emergency departments. When teens are risk for suicide and are discharged from an emergency room, the best way to reach them is using the communication tools that they already use and trust.
Hotlines are available for at-risk teens via toll-free numbers and live chat, but the #1 preferred form of communication for young people is SMS. Crisis Text Line (CTL), now in its beta version, is a way for teens who need help to use their mobile phones to access free support 24/7.
Crisis centers face significant challenges when trying to reach teens:

It’s difficult to follow-up with teens. Teens can be hard to reach, in order to make sure they receive the follow-up care they need. They are particularly reluctant to reach out for help in-person. Privacy is hard to secure using existing methods. Phone calls aren't discreet. Social media is inherently public.
Hotlines are becoming less relevant for young people as teens shy away from phone use. In 2009, only 30-38% of teens used phones every day. Teens have limited web access. 12% of teens have no access to the Internet at home, and another 10% have only dial-up Internet. These teens often rely on shared computers in schools and in public libraries, which makes it difficult for the "live chat" offered by many hotlines to reach these teens.

Our solution is beautifully simple.

Provide crisis intervention services and referrals to teens using texts which are sent via a mix of automated messages and live, trained specialists. Text messages offer a discreet, familiar, and accessible form of communication for teens. This gives teens with any mobile phone with SMS capability the ability to access support through CTL.
Automated messages can be rigorously A/B tested to determine the best approach. Live, trained specialists who have extensive training via Link2Health Solutions, which runs the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, provide support with safety planning and referrals. We conduct innovative data analysis of follow-up messages, strategies, and outcomes for teens, which can lead to innovations that will reduce the recidivism rate of teens in crisis (i.e.,reduce teens’ crisis experiences and need for crisis services in the long term).

Before or after being discharged from an emergency room, teens can be given CTL’s shortcode. Once they send a message to CTL, we will provide service providers with a unique and critical channel to communicating with them to ensure they stay safe and healthy.